Tuesday, April 9th
MCZ 101, 26 Oxford Street, Harvard University
07:30 PM
Strangers in the Night:
Has light pollution led to firefly declines?
Avalon C. S. Owens
CEC President
Ph.D. candidate, Tufts University
Why do fireflies flash? Because they want to be seen! But their unique bioluminescent courtship signals can be obscured by street lamps, house lights, and other sources of nighttime light pollution — and if we’re not careful, our lights might extinguish theirs forever. Learn more about the total impact of light pollution on firefly reproduction, and methods whereby fireflies, moths, and other essential members of the nocturnal ecosystem can continue to coexist with humans on this increasingly urbanized planet.
Avalon Owens is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Biology at Tufts University, where she studies the impact of light pollution on North American fireflies. She earned her Masters degree in Entomology from National Taiwan University, and hosts a bilingual educational YouTube channel called INSECT ISLAND.
Tuesday, March 12th
MCZ 101, 26 Oxford Street, Harvard University
07:30 PM
The gene drive, New World screwworm,
and the foundational assumption
Kevin Esvelt
Assistant Professor, MIT Media Lab
Female Cochyliomyia hominivorax blowflies lay their eggs in open wounds. Their eggs quickly hatch into “screwworm” maggots that devour the surrounding tissue. Before they metamorphose, the maggots emit a pheromone to attract new females, thereby acting as both conductors and performers in a macabre parade that consumes the host alive.
Dr. Esvelt and his team were the first to outline how CRISPR could be used to build stable “gene drives” capable of efficiently altering wild populations of parasitoids and disease vectors. More recently, he and his Sculpting Evolution group have devised a new form of technology, ‘daisy drives’, to let communities alter wild organisms in local ecosystems. By carefully developing and testing these methods with openness and humility, Dr. Esvelt seeks to address difficult ecological problems for the benefit of humanity and the natural world.
The talk is free and open to the public. The meeting is readily accessible via public transportation. Parking is available in the Oxford Street Garage with advance arrangement, as described here, or (usually but not always) at spaces on nearby streets. Everyone is also welcome to join us for dinner before the talk (beginning at 5:45 PM) at the Cambridge Common, 1667 Mass Ave., Cambridge.
CEC meetings are held the second Tuesday of the month from October through May. The evening schedule typically includes an informal dinner (5:45 to 7:15 PM) followed by our formal meeting (7:30 – 9:00 PM). The latter begins with club business and is followed by a 60-minute entomology related presentation. Membership is open to amateur and professional entomologists.
